Today is the seventy-fifth anniversary of Bloody Monday (I'm typing this on 1 August at 8:50 p.m. Hawaii time). I have seen nothing commemorating the Hilo Massacre in the local paper or the local press in general.
Thursday, August 01, 2013
According to Max Blumenthal on Mondoweiss, the online broadcast of Al Jazeera English will end with the launch of Al Jazeera America, formerly known as Current.
3 August update:
MT @andrewchappelle: Sad ...apparently AJAM's launch means an end to AJE radio programs in US as well. http://t.co/NhoaMFG664 via @kcet
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) August 4, 2013
Monday, July 29, 2013
Kunstler: The Dreamtime
Here.
The Dreamtime
by James Howard Kunstler
The idea that techno-industrial society is headed toward a collapse has become very unpopular the last couple of years. Thoughts (and fears) about it have been replaced by a kind of grand redemption fantasy that bears the same relation to economics that masturbation has to pornography. One way to sum up the current psychological state of the nation is that an awful lot of people who ought to know better don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground anymore. We’re witnessing the implosion of the American hive mind.
This is what comes of divorcing truth from reality, and that process is exactly what you get in the effort to replace authentic economic activity with accounting fraud and propaganda. For five years, the Federal Reserve has been trying to offset a permanent and necessary contraction of techno-industrialism by lobbing mortar rounds of so-called “money” into its crony “primary dealer” banks in order to fuel interest rate carry trades that produce an echo in the stock markets. An echo, let us be clear, is the ghost of something, not the thing itself — in this case: value.
The permanent contraction of techno-industrialism is necessary because the main fuel for running it has become scarcer and rather expensive, too expensive really to run the infrastructure of the United States. That infrastructure cannot be replaced now without a great deal of capital sacrifice. Paul Krugman — whom other observers unironically call Dr. Paul Krugman, conferring shamanic powers on him — wrote a supremely stupid op-ed in The New York Times today (“Stranded by Sprawl”), as though he had only noticed over the past week that the favored development pattern of our country has had adverse economic consequences. Gosh, ya think?
Meanwhile, the public has been sold a story by nervous and wishful upholders of the status quo that we have no problem with our primary resource due to the shale oil and shale gas bonanzas that would make us “energy independent” and “the world’s leading oil exporter — Saudi America!” A related story along these lines is the imminent “American industrial renaissance.” What they leave out is that, if actually true, it would be a renaissance of robots, leaving the former (and long ago) well-paid American working class to stew in its patrimony of methadrine, incest, and tattoo “art.”
To put it as simply as possible, the main task before this society is to change the way we live. The necessary changes are so severe and represent so much loss of previous investment that we can’t bring ourselves to think about it. For instance, both the suburbs and the big cities are toast. The destiny of the suburbs is to become slums, salvage yards, and ruins. The destiny of the big cities is to become Detroit — though most of America’s big cities (Atlanta, Houston) are hybrid monstrosities of suburbs and cities, and they will suffer the most. It is not recognized by economic poobahs such as Dr. Krugman and Thomas Friedman that the principal economic activity of Dixieland the past half century was the manufacture of suburban sprawl and now that the endeavor is over, the result can be seen in the millions of unemployed Ford F-110 owners drinking themselves into an incipient political fury.
Then where will the people live? They will live in smaller cities and cities that succeed in downsizing sharply and in America’s currently neglected and desolate small towns and upon a landscape drastically refitted for a post-techo-industrial life that is as far removed from a Ray Kurzweil “Singularity” fantasy as the idea of civic virtue is removed from Lawrence Summers. The people will live in places with a meaningful relationship to food production.
Many of those aforementioned swindled, misled, and debauched lumpen folk (having finally sold off their Ford-F110s) will eventually see their prospects migrate back into the realm of agriculture, or at least their surviving progeny will, as the sugar-tit of federal benefits melts away to zero, and by then the population will be much lower. These days, surely, the idea of physical labor in the sorghum rows is abhorrent to a 325-pound food-stamp recipient lounging in an air-conditioned trailer engrossed in the televised adventures of Kim Kardashian and her celebrated vagina while feasting on a KFC 10-piece bundle and a 32 oz Mountain Dew. But the hypothetical grand-kids might have to adopt a different view after the last air-conditioner sputters to extinction, and fire-ants have eaten through the particle-board floor of the trailer, and all the magical KFC products recede into the misty past where Jenny Lind rubs elbows with the Knights of the Round Table . Perhaps I wax a little hyperbolic, but you get the idea: subsistence is the real deal-to-come, and it will be literally a harder row to hoe than the current conception of “poverty.”
Somewhere beyond this mannerist picture of the current cultural depravity is the glimmer of an idea of people behaving better and spending their waking lives at things worth doing (and worthy of their human-ness), but that re-enchantment of daily life awaits a rather harsh work-out of the reigning deformations. I will go so far to predict that the recent national mood of wishful fantasy is running out of gas and that a more fatalistic view of our manifold predicaments will take its place in a few months. It would at least signal a rapprochment of truth with reality.
The Dreamtime
by James Howard Kunstler
The idea that techno-industrial society is headed toward a collapse has become very unpopular the last couple of years. Thoughts (and fears) about it have been replaced by a kind of grand redemption fantasy that bears the same relation to economics that masturbation has to pornography. One way to sum up the current psychological state of the nation is that an awful lot of people who ought to know better don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground anymore. We’re witnessing the implosion of the American hive mind.
This is what comes of divorcing truth from reality, and that process is exactly what you get in the effort to replace authentic economic activity with accounting fraud and propaganda. For five years, the Federal Reserve has been trying to offset a permanent and necessary contraction of techno-industrialism by lobbing mortar rounds of so-called “money” into its crony “primary dealer” banks in order to fuel interest rate carry trades that produce an echo in the stock markets. An echo, let us be clear, is the ghost of something, not the thing itself — in this case: value.
The permanent contraction of techno-industrialism is necessary because the main fuel for running it has become scarcer and rather expensive, too expensive really to run the infrastructure of the United States. That infrastructure cannot be replaced now without a great deal of capital sacrifice. Paul Krugman — whom other observers unironically call Dr. Paul Krugman, conferring shamanic powers on him — wrote a supremely stupid op-ed in The New York Times today (“Stranded by Sprawl”), as though he had only noticed over the past week that the favored development pattern of our country has had adverse economic consequences. Gosh, ya think?
Meanwhile, the public has been sold a story by nervous and wishful upholders of the status quo that we have no problem with our primary resource due to the shale oil and shale gas bonanzas that would make us “energy independent” and “the world’s leading oil exporter — Saudi America!” A related story along these lines is the imminent “American industrial renaissance.” What they leave out is that, if actually true, it would be a renaissance of robots, leaving the former (and long ago) well-paid American working class to stew in its patrimony of methadrine, incest, and tattoo “art.”
To put it as simply as possible, the main task before this society is to change the way we live. The necessary changes are so severe and represent so much loss of previous investment that we can’t bring ourselves to think about it. For instance, both the suburbs and the big cities are toast. The destiny of the suburbs is to become slums, salvage yards, and ruins. The destiny of the big cities is to become Detroit — though most of America’s big cities (Atlanta, Houston) are hybrid monstrosities of suburbs and cities, and they will suffer the most. It is not recognized by economic poobahs such as Dr. Krugman and Thomas Friedman that the principal economic activity of Dixieland the past half century was the manufacture of suburban sprawl and now that the endeavor is over, the result can be seen in the millions of unemployed Ford F-110 owners drinking themselves into an incipient political fury.
Then where will the people live? They will live in smaller cities and cities that succeed in downsizing sharply and in America’s currently neglected and desolate small towns and upon a landscape drastically refitted for a post-techo-industrial life that is as far removed from a Ray Kurzweil “Singularity” fantasy as the idea of civic virtue is removed from Lawrence Summers. The people will live in places with a meaningful relationship to food production.
Many of those aforementioned swindled, misled, and debauched lumpen folk (having finally sold off their Ford-F110s) will eventually see their prospects migrate back into the realm of agriculture, or at least their surviving progeny will, as the sugar-tit of federal benefits melts away to zero, and by then the population will be much lower. These days, surely, the idea of physical labor in the sorghum rows is abhorrent to a 325-pound food-stamp recipient lounging in an air-conditioned trailer engrossed in the televised adventures of Kim Kardashian and her celebrated vagina while feasting on a KFC 10-piece bundle and a 32 oz Mountain Dew. But the hypothetical grand-kids might have to adopt a different view after the last air-conditioner sputters to extinction, and fire-ants have eaten through the particle-board floor of the trailer, and all the magical KFC products recede into the misty past where Jenny Lind rubs elbows with the Knights of the Round Table . Perhaps I wax a little hyperbolic, but you get the idea: subsistence is the real deal-to-come, and it will be literally a harder row to hoe than the current conception of “poverty.”
Somewhere beyond this mannerist picture of the current cultural depravity is the glimmer of an idea of people behaving better and spending their waking lives at things worth doing (and worthy of their human-ness), but that re-enchantment of daily life awaits a rather harsh work-out of the reigning deformations. I will go so far to predict that the recent national mood of wishful fantasy is running out of gas and that a more fatalistic view of our manifold predicaments will take its place in a few months. It would at least signal a rapprochment of truth with reality.
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Kenny Loggins, "If You Believe"/"This is It"
As T.S. Flossie approaches, an opportunity to play this:
"If You Believe" is originally from the 1991 album Leap of Faith. This version is from the 1993 live album Outside from the Redwoods.
"If You Believe" is originally from the 1991 album Leap of Faith. This version is from the 1993 live album Outside from the Redwoods.
Madonna the Album Released Thirty Years Ago
An article on who should receive credit for launching the career of one of the twentieth century's most accomplished popular singers.
Saturday, July 27, 2013
Friday, July 26, 2013
Some Links
Orlov's blog maintains that communalism (a.k.a. small-c communism) is more efficient than market-based or central-government societies.
At NancyNall.com, they're gnashing their teeth at the possible sale of artworks from the Detroit Institute of Arts.
And The Oil Drum website will stop publishing after eight years.
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
What Does This Mean?
Does Max mean most people? Most "extreme conservatives"? He doesn't specify. Also, how does he define "fascist"?
It is emotionally/psychologically easier for most to be fascist: http://t.co/lIj6hFShlh
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) July 24, 2013
Monday, July 22, 2013
Kunstler: Requiem for Detroit
An excerpt is below:
Requiem for Detroit.
It’s fitting that Detroit is the first great American city to officially bite the dust, because it produced the means of America’s suicidal destruction: the automobile. Of course you could argue that the motorcar was an inevitable product of the industrial era — and I would not bother to enlist a mob of post-doc philosophy professors to debate that — but the choices we made about what to do with the automobile is another matter. What we chose was to let our great cities go to hell and move outside them in a car-dependent utopia tricked out as a simulacrum of “country living.” The entire experiment of suburbia can, of course, be construed as historically inevitable, too, but is also destined to be abandoned — and sooner than most Americans realize.
Finally, what we’ll be left with is a tremendous continental-sized vista of waste and desolation, the end product of this technological thrill ride called Modernity. It’s hard to find redemption in this story, unless it’s a world made by hand, with all its implications for a return to human-ness.
What happened to Detroit will come to all the other great American metroplexes in time, but perhaps not in the same way. So-called urban experts like Ed Glaeser at Harvard (The Triumph of the City), and other exalted idiots just don’t get it. These cities attained a scale of operation that just can’t be sustained beyond the twilight of cheap fossil fuels. They will all contract massively — some of them, such as Phoenix and Las Vegas will disappear altogether. The lucky ones will reconstitute themselves at much smaller scale around their old harbors or riverfronts. The ones burdened with too many grandiose mega-structures (New York, Chicago) will choke to death on the liabilities they represent. The reason for this can be found in the basic equations around the cost and supply of energy resources and the consequent impairments of capital formation. In short, neither the affordable energy nor the money will be there to run things as we’re used to running them. The voodoo economists of the [I]vy League, the White House, the Federal Reserve, and The New York Times are utterly clueless about how this works.
====
26 July update: Kunstler's walking tour of Detroit in 2009, supplemented by Google Street View.
====
28 July update: Oakland County (MI) executive director L. Brooks Patterson, recently featured in Bloomberg Businessweek, loves sprawl.
Requiem for Detroit.
It’s fitting that Detroit is the first great American city to officially bite the dust, because it produced the means of America’s suicidal destruction: the automobile. Of course you could argue that the motorcar was an inevitable product of the industrial era — and I would not bother to enlist a mob of post-doc philosophy professors to debate that — but the choices we made about what to do with the automobile is another matter. What we chose was to let our great cities go to hell and move outside them in a car-dependent utopia tricked out as a simulacrum of “country living.” The entire experiment of suburbia can, of course, be construed as historically inevitable, too, but is also destined to be abandoned — and sooner than most Americans realize.
Finally, what we’ll be left with is a tremendous continental-sized vista of waste and desolation, the end product of this technological thrill ride called Modernity. It’s hard to find redemption in this story, unless it’s a world made by hand, with all its implications for a return to human-ness.
What happened to Detroit will come to all the other great American metroplexes in time, but perhaps not in the same way. So-called urban experts like Ed Glaeser at Harvard (The Triumph of the City), and other exalted idiots just don’t get it. These cities attained a scale of operation that just can’t be sustained beyond the twilight of cheap fossil fuels. They will all contract massively — some of them, such as Phoenix and Las Vegas will disappear altogether. The lucky ones will reconstitute themselves at much smaller scale around their old harbors or riverfronts. The ones burdened with too many grandiose mega-structures (New York, Chicago) will choke to death on the liabilities they represent. The reason for this can be found in the basic equations around the cost and supply of energy resources and the consequent impairments of capital formation. In short, neither the affordable energy nor the money will be there to run things as we’re used to running them. The voodoo economists of the [I]vy League, the White House, the Federal Reserve, and The New York Times are utterly clueless about how this works.
====
26 July update: Kunstler's walking tour of Detroit in 2009, supplemented by Google Street View.
====
28 July update: Oakland County (MI) executive director L. Brooks Patterson, recently featured in Bloomberg Businessweek, loves sprawl.
Max Blumenthal's Goliath Pushed Back Yet Again
Max Blumenthal's book Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel is now to be released on 1 October 2013, according to its Amazon.com page.
Previously announced release dates:
11 June 2013
9 April 2013
April 2013
Previously announced release dates:
11 June 2013
9 April 2013
April 2013
Sunday, July 21, 2013
Notes from a Telecast of the 2013 Harlem Book Fair on C-Span
Below are notes I took during yesterday's live broadcast of the 2013 Harlem Book Fair on C-Span. Harriet Washington was interviewed after her panel discussion and that is when I started watching.
==============
Harriet Washington
--Deadly Monopolies
--Medical Apartheid (2007 Natl. Book Critics Circle Awd.)
--------------
E.R. Shipp
Morgan State U.
jrnlist-in-res.
Carl Hart
High Price
"Drugs are tools."
-------------
Tina Campt
Other Germans
>Peniel Joseph
--Dark Days, Bright Nights: From Black Power to Barack Obama
Tufts U. hist. prof.
--The Bk Power Movement
--Neighb. Rebels
>Kendall Thomas
--Co-ed. Critical Race Theory: The Key Writings That Formed the Movement
Ctr. for the Study of Law and Culture and law prof. at Columbia U. Law Sch.
"racial moralism"
"the"
context--"the word can mean everything and nothing"
recognition vs. indifference
progress vs. retrenchment---> Obama asking for conv. on race but refuses to lead it.
>Farah Griffin
--Harlem Nocturne: Women Artists and Progressive Politics [in] World War II
prof. Eng. and Comp. Lit. + AA Stud. Columbia U.
problem she has w/ personal anecdotes "becomes the end all and be all"
-->gets lost: Pres. Govt. no role for them to do anything about it.
Personal anecdote not good when it trumps what has to be done
-->absurdity of judge's allowing use of "profiling" but not "racial profiling"
Peniel Joseph
The new racism:
--outcomes
--disparities
--only 1.6% [of African Americans] make more than $200K.
--28% below fed. poverty level.
Substantive policy change
beyond
no urban agenda
no confrontation of new Jim Crow
Trayvon Martin: posthumous portrayal as a criminal
841,000 black males in jail
-->The further we deny racism exists the worse it gets
-->Harlem Bklyn gentrified
"We need to confront it and force [the President's] hand."
Kendall Thomas: "privatization of race"
the idea of racism and its "private resolution"
The heart of racism is "economic injustice"
Obama "is himself a commodity" One of the deepest challenges we face is the bankruptcy of a political system controlled by financial elites.
KT calls Reagan the "Architect of liberalism." [I.e., neoliberalism]
KT, cont. "Identity is being mobilized" to discredit claims for justice.
Following KT's comments on neoliberalism:
TINA CAMPT: "The offloading" of the conversation of race into pvt. sphere
-->What wd effective ldrship be?
Peniel: "That's happening already" at grassroots
The Age of Trayvon
People who've abdicated their role of activists for access.
>Those who give Obama a pass.
Ray Kelly: "The nation's biggest racial profiler."
MLK traded access to LBJ's Wh. House for moral clarity
Poor People's March
"can't do the colorblind racism game"
KT discusses "From Protest to Poliics" [by Bayard] Rustin
Griffin: the old-fashioned idea of charismatic leadership
Electoral politics is only one avenue
--Ella Baker
--Ida B. Wells
--Fannie Lou Hamer
grassroots leaders
communities, groups
a model of ldrship
NYT art. about frmr gang ldrs org against violence
FARAH: Stand Yr Grd Laws not explicitly racist but applied not in a race-neutral way.
What do you expect from Obama after his presidency?
Do something about prison, health...
tainted products [being sent to Africa]
K.T. The law's limits are sometimes greater than what it can accomplish
-->On Obama's statement about his children's generation thinking about race.
Hopeful but it's the experience of a very narrow section of African Americans.
Segregation still alive
Racial publics: committed to anti-racist agendas.
K.T. "I am not a person of faith."---No single role orgs can play nor single method.
Peniel: A research org @ Tufts: race and democracy connecting to public policy
"We want public policy transformation[s]"
Farah: Measure of success can't just be by Sasha and Malia but by gulf between Juror B-37 and Rachel Jeantel
Farah: Twitter irritating but allows back-and-forth. "Angry at the access racists have" to her... Messy, but democ. debate
Farah: There's a focus on natl. elections but what about local elections?
"We need to be just as vigilant about those elections as well."
Audience member: African American pols "ghettofied" to narrow districts. Tea Party better organized.
K.T. Talking about "a long revolution." Politics is often about how we imagine ourselves in relation to others. Nation: "imagined community"
"[P]olitics of the imagination" no subst.for hard work but motivates people to think critically and even refuse neolib.
Audience member: What about Alton Maddox?
======
It was then that the panel discussion had to end.
==============
Harriet Washington
--Deadly Monopolies
--Medical Apartheid (2007 Natl. Book Critics Circle Awd.)
--------------
E.R. Shipp
Morgan State U.
jrnlist-in-res.
Carl Hart
High Price
"Drugs are tools."
-------------
Tina Campt
Other Germans
>Peniel Joseph
--Dark Days, Bright Nights: From Black Power to Barack Obama
Tufts U. hist. prof.
--The Bk Power Movement
--Neighb. Rebels
>Kendall Thomas
--Co-ed. Critical Race Theory: The Key Writings That Formed the Movement
Ctr. for the Study of Law and Culture and law prof. at Columbia U. Law Sch.
"racial moralism"
"the"
context--"the word can mean everything and nothing"
recognition vs. indifference
progress vs. retrenchment---> Obama asking for conv. on race but refuses to lead it.
>Farah Griffin
--Harlem Nocturne: Women Artists and Progressive Politics [in] World War II
prof. Eng. and Comp. Lit. + AA Stud. Columbia U.
problem she has w/ personal anecdotes "becomes the end all and be all"
-->gets lost: Pres. Govt. no role for them to do anything about it.
Personal anecdote not good when it trumps what has to be done
-->absurdity of judge's allowing use of "profiling" but not "racial profiling"
Peniel Joseph
The new racism:
--outcomes
--disparities
--only 1.6% [of African Americans] make more than $200K.
--28% below fed. poverty level.
Substantive policy change
beyond
no urban agenda
no confrontation of new Jim Crow
Trayvon Martin: posthumous portrayal as a criminal
841,000 black males in jail
-->The further we deny racism exists the worse it gets
-->Harlem Bklyn gentrified
"We need to confront it and force [the President's] hand."
Kendall Thomas: "privatization of race"
the idea of racism and its "private resolution"
The heart of racism is "economic injustice"
Obama "is himself a commodity" One of the deepest challenges we face is the bankruptcy of a political system controlled by financial elites.
KT calls Reagan the "Architect of liberalism." [I.e., neoliberalism]
KT, cont. "Identity is being mobilized" to discredit claims for justice.
Following KT's comments on neoliberalism:
TINA CAMPT: "The offloading" of the conversation of race into pvt. sphere
-->What wd effective ldrship be?
Peniel: "That's happening already" at grassroots
The Age of Trayvon
People who've abdicated their role of activists for access.
>Those who give Obama a pass.
Ray Kelly: "The nation's biggest racial profiler."
MLK traded access to LBJ's Wh. House for moral clarity
Poor People's March
"can't do the colorblind racism game"
KT discusses "From Protest to Poliics" [by Bayard] Rustin
Griffin: the old-fashioned idea of charismatic leadership
Electoral politics is only one avenue
--Ella Baker
--Ida B. Wells
--Fannie Lou Hamer
grassroots leaders
communities, groups
a model of ldrship
NYT art. about frmr gang ldrs org against violence
FARAH: Stand Yr Grd Laws not explicitly racist but applied not in a race-neutral way.
What do you expect from Obama after his presidency?
Do something about prison, health...
tainted products [being sent to Africa]
K.T. The law's limits are sometimes greater than what it can accomplish
-->On Obama's statement about his children's generation thinking about race.
Hopeful but it's the experience of a very narrow section of African Americans.
Segregation still alive
Racial publics: committed to anti-racist agendas.
K.T. "I am not a person of faith."---No single role orgs can play nor single method.
Peniel: A research org @ Tufts: race and democracy connecting to public policy
"We want public policy transformation[s]"
Farah: Measure of success can't just be by Sasha and Malia but by gulf between Juror B-37 and Rachel Jeantel
Farah: Twitter irritating but allows back-and-forth. "Angry at the access racists have" to her... Messy, but democ. debate
Farah: There's a focus on natl. elections but what about local elections?
"We need to be just as vigilant about those elections as well."
Audience member: African American pols "ghettofied" to narrow districts. Tea Party better organized.
K.T. Talking about "a long revolution." Politics is often about how we imagine ourselves in relation to others. Nation: "imagined community"
"[P]olitics of the imagination" no subst.for hard work but motivates people to think critically and even refuse neolib.
Audience member: What about Alton Maddox?
======
It was then that the panel discussion had to end.
Some Thoughts on Trayvon Martin and Kunstler (a post in progress)
I don't know if Kunstler will mention Trayvon Martin in his blog tomorrow. Last Monday's post suggests a wide gulf between black and white people, particularly younger black people and older white ones. Kunstler came of age before the rise of hip hop but during a time of Black Power. Liberal whites who sympathized with the civil rights movement were put off by Black Power. As they grew older, they didn't know what to make of Afrocentrism or hip hop culture.
What are Kunstler's thoughts on hip hop? Based on his writings, he seems to think it's immature at best and nihilistic at worst. Unaware of the many genres and subgenres contained within hip hop, Kunstler gives Kanye West as an example of the gangsta rapper shouting "N---a!" He is right that a gulf stretches between black and white in America.
I welcome your thoughts as I add to this post.
What are Kunstler's thoughts on hip hop? Based on his writings, he seems to think it's immature at best and nihilistic at worst. Unaware of the many genres and subgenres contained within hip hop, Kunstler gives Kanye West as an example of the gangsta rapper shouting "N---a!" He is right that a gulf stretches between black and white in America.
I welcome your thoughts as I add to this post.
Saturday, July 20, 2013
Friday, July 19, 2013
Sexism Gets One Nowhere
A gratuitous comment on Pamela Geller's looks, not statements.
He can write better. This is lazy. But he tends to insinuate (see his recent comments on Joyce Carol Oates) and make cheap shots.
@hsmoghul her face already stars in a claymation horror flick.
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) July 19, 2013
He can write better. This is lazy. But he tends to insinuate (see his recent comments on Joyce Carol Oates) and make cheap shots.
Thursday, July 18, 2013
Bu Lai
Hawaii TimeField Negro points out that Zimmerman attorneys Mark O'Mara and Don West were recently dining in a fancy New York restaurant, even though O'Mara claimed to fear for his life.
In Hawaii, we call that a bu lai.
Wednesday, July 17, 2013
Is College Useless?
The question is explored here. It depends on what one looks for. You could get rich with or without going to college, or at least without graduating from one. Consider professional athletes and computer magnates. The main value of college for some athletes, especially top ones, is exposure. To me, learning was and is its own reward, though I would have availed myself of the career center if I had to attend all ovewr again.
Kunstler on the Zimmerman Verdict
This column by Kunstler on the Zimmerman verdict appeared on Monday, but I wondered if I should link to it. I decided to post it with this caveat: Kunstler is very astute about the effects of oil scarcity but he has little understanding about this situation.
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Sunday, July 14, 2013
"Stress Will Age You"
Zimmerman is 29? He looks a lot older than that. Stress will age you.
— Akolea (@akolea) July 14, 2013
So will a bad diet, a mean streak, and an authoritarian personality.
Saturday, July 13, 2013
The Heat
The Heat is doing well at the box office domestically, but not internationally. The main reason, perhaps, is that Melissa McCarthy is not yet famous outside America. It could also be that the international audience isn't used to female buddy comedies. Who knows?
But it's always interesting to see the gulf between American and international box office. Some movies do poorly in the States, but colossal internationally. And vice versa.
But it's always interesting to see the gulf between American and international box office. Some movies do poorly in the States, but colossal internationally. And vice versa.
The George Zimmerman Verdict
Presumably he's talking about the press, maybe those on TV. What are "mid level authoritarian traits" anyway? From what I could see, George Zimmerman had low empathy and high-level authoritarian traits.
Also, Zimmerman will get his gun back.
This guy tweeted this,
leading Max to ask rhetorically, What's the term for one lacking empathy?
@michaelarria is is a profession that seems to attract many with low empathy/mid level authoritarian traits
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) July 14, 2013
Also, Zimmerman will get his gun back.
This guy tweeted this,
Have to admit, I find the idea of rooting for someone to be convicted to be a bit strange if you have no personal connection to the case.
— Blake Hounshell (@blakehounshell) July 14, 2013
leading Max to ask rhetorically, What's the term for one lacking empathy?
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
Saturday, July 06, 2013
Wednesday, July 03, 2013
Monday, July 01, 2013
Saturday, June 29, 2013
Friday, June 28, 2013
Dr. Calculus, "Full of Love"
This song is from the soundtrack of She's Having a Baby (1988). The movie was screened in my senior-year religion/social issues class, along with Kramer vs. Kramer, Father of the Bride (the 1991 remake with Steve Martin), and Mrs. Doubtfire, as examples of family life and problems faced by families. Anyway, when "Full of Love" played during the movie, one of my classmates cracked, "This is cherry music." (It is.) The lyric, Your mind goes yo, has stayed with me all this time, though I remembered it as Your mind says yo.
("Full of Love" is the kind of musical confection that could only be made at this time.)
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Editorial Cartoons That Insult One's Intelligence
Ted Rall: "Not Safe for Cartoon Fans With Taste or Brains" Alternative cartoonist Ted Rall's overview of mainstream editorial cartoons that either attack Edward Snowden or conflate the late actor James Gandolfini with his character of Tony Soprano.
When J.D. Salinger died, Koterba (one of the featured cartoonists) drew a cartoon of a boy surrounded by the usual kid gadgets but engrossed in The Catcher in the Rye. It's possible but more likely the youngster was reading The Hunger Games.
Saturday, June 22, 2013
Summer Begins
Summer began Friday and I'm still in spring-cleaning mode. Optimistically, we could clean everything up in a few weeks, but realistically, it'll take longer.
Friday, June 21, 2013
Blogger Field Negro Might Join Planned Online Magazine
From The Field Negro blog:
Still, I am sick of just blogging about this kind of carnage in our streets that everyone else is ignoring. This includes black leaders and politricksters who seem to just shrug their collective shoulders like the rest of America.
We all better start coming up with some solutions very soon. You can only build but so many prisons and close so many schools. The chickens will come home one day.
There is plenty of blame to go around: Trifling sperm donors, crooked politicians, the NRA, a lack of jobs, lack of a proper family structure.... I could go on, but the list is too long for this particular post.
But enough about all the problems, we all know what they are.
Someone I respect reached out to me recently and they will be launching a solutions based online magazine soon. I don't want to say too much because it is still in its infant stage. But soon I hope to be involved with that project and writing about solutions and engaging in critical thinking with folks who are trying to come up with solutions as well.
I still love my blog (although the partisan trolls and racists who comment can get a little tiresome at times), so I will continue with TFN for now.
Stay tuned.
Still, I am sick of just blogging about this kind of carnage in our streets that everyone else is ignoring. This includes black leaders and politricksters who seem to just shrug their collective shoulders like the rest of America.
We all better start coming up with some solutions very soon. You can only build but so many prisons and close so many schools. The chickens will come home one day.
There is plenty of blame to go around: Trifling sperm donors, crooked politicians, the NRA, a lack of jobs, lack of a proper family structure.... I could go on, but the list is too long for this particular post.
But enough about all the problems, we all know what they are.
Someone I respect reached out to me recently and they will be launching a solutions based online magazine soon. I don't want to say too much because it is still in its infant stage. But soon I hope to be involved with that project and writing about solutions and engaging in critical thinking with folks who are trying to come up with solutions as well.
I still love my blog (although the partisan trolls and racists who comment can get a little tiresome at times), so I will continue with TFN for now.
Stay tuned.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Tuesday, June 18, 2013
U can fool some music critics all of the time MT @RaniaKhalek: Toure cannot contain his excitement about claims that 50 terror plots foiled
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) June 18, 2013
As Kelso would say, Burn!
Monday, June 17, 2013
Kunstler: "Paths of Folly"
Kunstler, "Paths of Folly"
Articles linked therein:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/business/economy/even-pessimists-feel-optimistic-over-economy.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp&
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/world/asia/chinas-great-uprooting-moving-250-million-into-cities.html?pagewanted=all
Saturday, June 15, 2013
Snowstorm
As I've said, some of the most trenchant criticism of Obamaism comes from the Black Left.
The Snowden affair is revealing all kinds of strange things. Most of the commenters at Nancy Nall, who would've gnashed their teeth if Bush had done this, are taking the matter in stride. David Ehrenstein has taken to casting aspersions on both Snowden and "his poolboy" Glenn Greenwald.
More later.
16 June update: This is a brief listing of various figures and their positions on the NSA revelations. Right now it's blank. It's not a straightforward left-right matter, as one can tell.
Pro-Obama/anti-Snowden:, a.k.a.
Anti-Obama/pro-Snowden:
Pro-Obama/pro-Snowden:
Anti-Obama/anti-Snowden:
The Snowden affair is revealing all kinds of strange things. Most of the commenters at Nancy Nall, who would've gnashed their teeth if Bush had done this, are taking the matter in stride. David Ehrenstein has taken to casting aspersions on both Snowden and "his poolboy" Glenn Greenwald.
More later.
16 June update: This is a brief listing of various figures and their positions on the NSA revelations. Right now it's blank. It's not a straightforward left-right matter, as one can tell.
Pro-Obama/anti-Snowden:, a.k.a.
Liberal O-pologists homed in on Snowden's personal life, then went after a CNET story. Anything not to engage substance of spying programs.
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) June 17, 2013
Anti-Obama/pro-Snowden:
Pro-Obama/pro-Snowden:
Anti-Obama/anti-Snowden:
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Private/Public
Tanner Flake, learn that whatever you post online is not private.
That also goes for all the Twitterheads who verbally attacked a Mexican-American boy (who was a big hit on America's Got Talent, incidentally) for singing the national anthem.
Moreover, Tanner (and son of Nevada congressman Joe Heck, and others) are giving Max Blumenthal another chance to gloat (see above).
Reading Joey Heck's tweets (which as of last night are still up and open to the public), I find most of them the typical gripes of a white middle class teenage boy: boring teachers, tough sports practices, etc. The racist and homophobic comments are probably no worse than those one hears in passing. Mainly, I hope Joey and Tanner, et al. shed their ignorance as they mature.
That also goes for all the Twitterheads who verbally attacked a Mexican-American boy (who was a big hit on America's Got Talent, incidentally) for singing the national anthem.
GOP Reps' sons on Twitter: son #1 on Obama "spear chucking" http://t.co/jmN5mJzkZC son #2 goes by "n1ggerkiller" http://t.co/Dbl2r9eYwG
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) June 14, 2013
Moreover, Tanner (and son of Nevada congressman Joe Heck, and others) are giving Max Blumenthal another chance to gloat (see above).
Reading Joey Heck's tweets (which as of last night are still up and open to the public), I find most of them the typical gripes of a white middle class teenage boy: boring teachers, tough sports practices, etc. The racist and homophobic comments are probably no worse than those one hears in passing. Mainly, I hope Joey and Tanner, et al. shed their ignorance as they mature.
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Friday, June 07, 2013
Driving thru Texas and Louisiana, I turn on the radio and discover right-wing authoritarians have suddenly morphed into civil libertarians.
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) June 6, 2013
To which I'd add, And vice versa? Better late than never?
Thursday, June 06, 2013
Honolulu Weekly Ends Publication, Possibly For Good
Honolulu Weekly is folding.
So much to say. I'll point out that the Weekly bought the Hawai`i Island Journal a few years before it closed. And I remember when the Stephens company put out Big Island Weekly to compete with HIJ. Big Island Weekly had some substance when it began, but now....
The Weekly seems to have hit its peak in the early-to late-nineties, with talented writers and cartoonists like Bob Rees, Curt Sanburn, and Bob Pritchett. Borders in Hilo carried the paper for a time, too.
http://bambooridge.com/blog.aspx?bid=441
As Hattie says in the comments, Tiffany Edwards-Hunt publishes the Big Island Chronicle, a spinoff of her blog of the same name. But it's hard. If you like a magazine, newspaper, or blog, especially a small, struggling one, consider a donation.
And again, I'll have more to say later.
Former Weekly writer Chad Blair remembers the paper. He provides details of Honolulu Weekly's acquisition of Hawaii Island Journal in 2005. It was part of a plan to extend the Weekly's reach statewide. Blair doesn't mention it but in December 2006, Stephens issued Big Island Weekly (you know it from its hot pink vending boxes). HIJ was a relaunch of Kau Landing (1992-99), premiering in late 1999 and ending in 2008.
So much to say. I'll point out that the Weekly bought the Hawai`i Island Journal a few years before it closed. And I remember when the Stephens company put out Big Island Weekly to compete with HIJ. Big Island Weekly had some substance when it began, but now....
The Weekly seems to have hit its peak in the early-to late-nineties, with talented writers and cartoonists like Bob Rees, Curt Sanburn, and Bob Pritchett. Borders in Hilo carried the paper for a time, too.
http://bambooridge.com/blog.aspx?bid=441
As Hattie says in the comments, Tiffany Edwards-Hunt publishes the Big Island Chronicle, a spinoff of her blog of the same name. But it's hard. If you like a magazine, newspaper, or blog, especially a small, struggling one, consider a donation.
And again, I'll have more to say later.
Former Weekly writer Chad Blair remembers the paper. He provides details of Honolulu Weekly's acquisition of Hawaii Island Journal in 2005. It was part of a plan to extend the Weekly's reach statewide. Blair doesn't mention it but in December 2006, Stephens issued Big Island Weekly (you know it from its hot pink vending boxes). HIJ was a relaunch of Kau Landing (1992-99), premiering in late 1999 and ending in 2008.
Monday, June 03, 2013
Cliography
I've never heard of cliography before today.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1031461X.2011.640694
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1031461X.2011.640694
Kunstler: Out on a Limb
Kunstler elaborates on his statement that Japan will return to a medieval way of life. (Hattie, I read your comment about Kunstler and inner immigration, and I'll have something soon about Kunstler's general worldview.)
Out On a Limb
By James Howard Kunstler
on June 3, 2013 9:24 AM
There is one supreme and universal law of human relations in all its manifestations, social, political, economic, cultural: people create no end of mischief in the hours when they are not sleeping. Any vision of history-yet-to-come must be predicated on this principle.
A correspondent of mine objected to the idea I floated a couple of times that Japan would be the first advanced industrial nation to "go medieval." This prompts me to clarify that emphasis should be on the word "first." The re-set to a much lower scale and intensity of human activity is certain for all nations; the only questions are the time-frame and the quality of the journey and those are sure to vary from one group of people to another.
I picked on Japan because their journey seems to have compressed and accelerated in recent years and also because there's a lot to admire in their possible destination if history is any guide: a graceful culture of lower energy and high artistry. The transition between that older culture and the point of industrial take-off was also much sharper for Japan than so-called Western societies. They did not look back on the startling episode of Rome and they didn't experience a thrilling "Renaissance" of rediscovery in its technical achievements -- which eventuated in the Western discovery of a "new world" and all its exploitable resources. The Japanese were pestered by Catholic missionaries for a brief time beginning in the 1540s, but tossed them out in 1620s, along with the merchants who accompanied them -- and then very consciously barred the door. They even gave up on the guns that the Euro-people had introduced, regarding them as unsportsmanlike. Finally, Commodore Perry from the USA landed in the 1850s, with all the weight of Western technological momentum behind him, and demanded access to trade there and Japan, in effect, surrendered to modernity.
They also thrived on it for a while. For one thing, they had a lot of beautifully-made exotic cultural objects to trade with the west, and their artisan skill level in things like ceramics and metallurgy made the transition to industrial technology of their own easy. In half a century, Japan went from an isolated archipelago of tea ceremonies and silks to building steel battleships and airplanes, and we all know the mischief that led to during the first half of the horrid 20th century: the Rape of Nanking, the Bataan Death March, the bombing of Tokyo, and Hiroshima. Then came Act 2: postwar economic revival, the SONY stereo, Mitsubishi, major league baseball, and really excellent automobiles. That went on for while, too. About 40 years.
There was one insurmountable problem lurking in the background: Japan did not possess any fossil fuels, oil or methane gas, to run all the equipment of modernity that they had ramped up. That didn't matter so much when imported oil was $11-a-barrel, but it became crucial when the cost quickly rose to $100-a-barrel, as it did in recent years. It also began to matter that Japan's bigger neighbor and age-old rival (and sometimes victim), China, ramped up its own industrial economy which, of course, consumed a healthy portion of what the world oil market put up for sale. By the early 21st century, China was eating Japan's lunch (its bento box, shall we say) by manufacturing the same stuff that the Japanese had excelled at making, and all of a sudden the whole project of modernity in Japan hit the skids.
Then came the Tōhoku earthquake of 2011, and the giant wall of water that slammed, among other things, the multiple nuclear reactors at Fukushima. The Japanese industrial confederation had taken a certain amount of comfort in its ability to keep the electricity going by other means than fossil fuels. Now, all of a sudden, a nuclear dragon was loose upon the land, a veritable Godzilla, Japan's worst nightmare. A year later, all but two of Japan's nuclear power plants were shut down. By no coincidence, Japan also found itself wallowing in a trade deficit after decades of enjoying trade surpluses, due to the amount of oil and gas the nation had to import to keep the electricity running.
Japan's energy predicament is expressing itself in a financial crisis, naturally enough, since finance is a set of abstract markers for what is happening in an economy -- and the country's finances are pretty much running amok as its political leaders try desperately to adjust to the new realities of powerdown. They are employing accounting fraud to offset the inescapable failures of capital formation under the circumstances, the same as all the other advanced industrial nations. As a purely financial matter it simply amounts to no longer being able to generate enough new wealth to pay the interest on old credit, or to justify the creation of new credit. Since credit is the lifeblood of industrialism, the sun is setting on that phase of history. Japan finds itself in a dishonorable quandary and in tune with some of its older cultural infrastructure appears to be committing suicide with a sword thrust into the guts of its banking system.
America, in contrast, is driving over the edge of the Grand Canyon, Thelma-and-Louise-style. Europe is drinking a poison cup in sumptuous seclusion. China and India will just look like lemming marches into the increasingly vacant sea.
Financial hara-kiri might be the best outcome for Japan -- better, say, than a war with China over some desolate islands -- if Japan were to retreat as rapidly back into a traditional artisan economy as it bailed out of in the 1860s. I realize this is a long-shot and includes many knotty elements not under discussion here, such as population reduction and the fate of Fukushima. Also, history is almost never symmetrical. Things don't retrace the arc they came up. The journey will surely be bumpier. But Japan might get there first and set some interesting precedents for the rest of us.
At the heart of the matter is this. Industrialism is an entropic project. It accelerates and intensifies entropy, which is to say the drive toward disorder and death. Tradition in human societies is the great moderator of entropy. Of course nothing stays the same forever, but some of us would like to see the human project continue, and to get to place where it can feel comfortable with itself for a while, perhaps even something resembling a new (and completely unfamiliar) golden age, when the people not asleep can be trusted.
===
Update [P.Z.]: Much to consider here. I'll have more on Kunstler's general worldview soon, in particular, his view on gender and why he doesn't put much stock in renewable energy sources ever replacing fossil fuels.
Out On a Limb
By James Howard Kunstler
on June 3, 2013 9:24 AM
There is one supreme and universal law of human relations in all its manifestations, social, political, economic, cultural: people create no end of mischief in the hours when they are not sleeping. Any vision of history-yet-to-come must be predicated on this principle.
A correspondent of mine objected to the idea I floated a couple of times that Japan would be the first advanced industrial nation to "go medieval." This prompts me to clarify that emphasis should be on the word "first." The re-set to a much lower scale and intensity of human activity is certain for all nations; the only questions are the time-frame and the quality of the journey and those are sure to vary from one group of people to another.
I picked on Japan because their journey seems to have compressed and accelerated in recent years and also because there's a lot to admire in their possible destination if history is any guide: a graceful culture of lower energy and high artistry. The transition between that older culture and the point of industrial take-off was also much sharper for Japan than so-called Western societies. They did not look back on the startling episode of Rome and they didn't experience a thrilling "Renaissance" of rediscovery in its technical achievements -- which eventuated in the Western discovery of a "new world" and all its exploitable resources. The Japanese were pestered by Catholic missionaries for a brief time beginning in the 1540s, but tossed them out in 1620s, along with the merchants who accompanied them -- and then very consciously barred the door. They even gave up on the guns that the Euro-people had introduced, regarding them as unsportsmanlike. Finally, Commodore Perry from the USA landed in the 1850s, with all the weight of Western technological momentum behind him, and demanded access to trade there and Japan, in effect, surrendered to modernity.
They also thrived on it for a while. For one thing, they had a lot of beautifully-made exotic cultural objects to trade with the west, and their artisan skill level in things like ceramics and metallurgy made the transition to industrial technology of their own easy. In half a century, Japan went from an isolated archipelago of tea ceremonies and silks to building steel battleships and airplanes, and we all know the mischief that led to during the first half of the horrid 20th century: the Rape of Nanking, the Bataan Death March, the bombing of Tokyo, and Hiroshima. Then came Act 2: postwar economic revival, the SONY stereo, Mitsubishi, major league baseball, and really excellent automobiles. That went on for while, too. About 40 years.
There was one insurmountable problem lurking in the background: Japan did not possess any fossil fuels, oil or methane gas, to run all the equipment of modernity that they had ramped up. That didn't matter so much when imported oil was $11-a-barrel, but it became crucial when the cost quickly rose to $100-a-barrel, as it did in recent years. It also began to matter that Japan's bigger neighbor and age-old rival (and sometimes victim), China, ramped up its own industrial economy which, of course, consumed a healthy portion of what the world oil market put up for sale. By the early 21st century, China was eating Japan's lunch (its bento box, shall we say) by manufacturing the same stuff that the Japanese had excelled at making, and all of a sudden the whole project of modernity in Japan hit the skids.
Then came the Tōhoku earthquake of 2011, and the giant wall of water that slammed, among other things, the multiple nuclear reactors at Fukushima. The Japanese industrial confederation had taken a certain amount of comfort in its ability to keep the electricity going by other means than fossil fuels. Now, all of a sudden, a nuclear dragon was loose upon the land, a veritable Godzilla, Japan's worst nightmare. A year later, all but two of Japan's nuclear power plants were shut down. By no coincidence, Japan also found itself wallowing in a trade deficit after decades of enjoying trade surpluses, due to the amount of oil and gas the nation had to import to keep the electricity running.
Japan's energy predicament is expressing itself in a financial crisis, naturally enough, since finance is a set of abstract markers for what is happening in an economy -- and the country's finances are pretty much running amok as its political leaders try desperately to adjust to the new realities of powerdown. They are employing accounting fraud to offset the inescapable failures of capital formation under the circumstances, the same as all the other advanced industrial nations. As a purely financial matter it simply amounts to no longer being able to generate enough new wealth to pay the interest on old credit, or to justify the creation of new credit. Since credit is the lifeblood of industrialism, the sun is setting on that phase of history. Japan finds itself in a dishonorable quandary and in tune with some of its older cultural infrastructure appears to be committing suicide with a sword thrust into the guts of its banking system.
America, in contrast, is driving over the edge of the Grand Canyon, Thelma-and-Louise-style. Europe is drinking a poison cup in sumptuous seclusion. China and India will just look like lemming marches into the increasingly vacant sea.
Financial hara-kiri might be the best outcome for Japan -- better, say, than a war with China over some desolate islands -- if Japan were to retreat as rapidly back into a traditional artisan economy as it bailed out of in the 1860s. I realize this is a long-shot and includes many knotty elements not under discussion here, such as population reduction and the fate of Fukushima. Also, history is almost never symmetrical. Things don't retrace the arc they came up. The journey will surely be bumpier. But Japan might get there first and set some interesting precedents for the rest of us.
At the heart of the matter is this. Industrialism is an entropic project. It accelerates and intensifies entropy, which is to say the drive toward disorder and death. Tradition in human societies is the great moderator of entropy. Of course nothing stays the same forever, but some of us would like to see the human project continue, and to get to place where it can feel comfortable with itself for a while, perhaps even something resembling a new (and completely unfamiliar) golden age, when the people not asleep can be trusted.
===
Update [P.Z.]: Much to consider here. I'll have more on Kunstler's general worldview soon, in particular, his view on gender and why he doesn't put much stock in renewable energy sources ever replacing fossil fuels.
Sunday, June 02, 2013
Sauce for the Gander, Sauce for the Goose
NAACP's official magazine defends Obama's drone policy. Because it's Obama's policy? mobile.twitter.com/thecrisismag/s…
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) June 2, 2013
Some of the most trenchant criticism of the Administration comes from the Black Left (e.g., Adolph Reed, Margaret Kimberley, Glen Ford).
Saturday, June 01, 2013
Chris Farren and Amy Holland, "Learn to Love Again"
From the soundtrack of Night of the Comet (1984):
Friday, May 31, 2013
Time After Time
The latest cover of Time (U.S. edition) has the very apt headline "Chicago Bull" (a profile of Rahm Emanuel). The international editions are headlined "Why Gitmo Will Never Close." Interesting what Time thinks will grab American vs. overseas readers.
The Mermaid "Documentary"
Being busy (for reasons I'll divulge soon), I hadn't heard about Animal Planet's mermaid "documentary" until a friend of mine called Monday and left a message about a program she figured I'd be interested in. I returned her call and she said Animal Planet had a show on mermaids and the evidence for their existence. So I tuned in and thought, Hmmm. More later.
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/05/mermaids_aren_t_real_animal_planet_s_fake_documentaries_misrepresent_ocean.html?wpisrc=most_viral
(I wouldn't call the show a mockumentary, because it claims to present facts, although there was a disclaimer. Anyway, I saw a little bit then changed channels.)
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/05/mermaids_aren_t_real_animal_planet_s_fake_documentaries_misrepresent_ocean.html?wpisrc=most_viral
(I wouldn't call the show a mockumentary, because it claims to present facts, although there was a disclaimer. Anyway, I saw a little bit then changed channels.)
Monday, May 27, 2013
Kunstler: "Let's All Go Medieval"
Let's All Go Medieval
By James Howard Kunstler
on May 27, 2013 9:34 AM
That voice! All a'quiver with the dread of self-knowledge that it is confabulating a story, much like the "money" that his Open Market Committee spins out of the increasingly carbonized air. His words fill the vacuum of the collectively blank American mind, where hopes and dreams spin like debris in an Oklahoma twister, only to fall incoherently on a landscape of man-made ruins. If Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke were hooked up to a polygraph machine when he made a public statement -- such as last Wednesday's testimony before congress -- I bet the output graph would look something like a seismic record of the 9.0 Fukushima megathrust, all fretful spikes and dips.
When historians of the future ponder our fate around their campfires, they will marvel that this society invited such a temporizing little nerd to act as its Oracle-in-Chief... that he made periodic visits to sit before the poobahs of the land, and issued prophesies that nobody could really understand -- and that the fate of the people in this land hung on his muttered ambiguities. Let's face it: people need oracles when they don't know what the fuck is going on.
What's going on is as follows: America's central bank is trying to compensate for a floundering economy that will never return to its prior state. The economy is floundering because its scale and mode of operation are no longer consistent with what reality offers in the way of available resources at the right price, especially oil. So, rather than change the scale and mode of operations in this economy -- that is, do things differently -- we try to keep doing things the same by flushing more "money" into the system, as though it were a captive beast receiving nutriment.
One problem with that is that the "money" is no longer money. That is, it's not really an effective store of value, or pricing reference. It remains for the moment a medium of exchange, but the persons exchanging it grow suspicious of what this "money" purports to represent. Does it stand for promises of future repayment? Hmmmm. Those promises are looking sketchy lately, especially since this is an economy that does not generate enough new real wealth to make the interest payments, let alone manage to pay back the principal. Is it a claim on future work? Some are afraid that the future work deliverable will be less than they expect. Whatever else it is, does it find respect in other societies where different money is used?
These questions are making a lot of people nervous these days. Of course, a time will come when all matters concerning this particular incarnation of money will be seen as strictly ceremonial. Ben Bernanke, we will understand, was not stating facts before congress but rather singing a song, or rather chanting in a low, repetitive, tedious way in the primal manner of a frightened person trying to comfort himself with reassuring sound -- that is, prayer. You'd be surprised how well that goes over in a place like congress, which is stuffed with prayerful characters, people who exist in a religious delirium. These are not the people who are nervous, by the way. The nervous tend to be more secular, and inhabit the margins of life where unconventional thinking thrives weedlike at a remove from all the mental toxicity at the center.
These nervous ones are looking ever more closely these days at the distant nation of Japan, where an interesting scenario is playing out: the last days of a giant industrial-technocratic economy. The story there is actually pretty simple if you peel away the quasi-metaphysical bullshit it comes wrapped in these days from astrologasters like John Mauldin and Paul Krugman, viz. Japan has no fossil fuel resources. Zip. You can't run their kind of economy without the stuff. And they can't. Japan is crapping out, as they say in Las Vegas. Tilt! Game over. As this happens, Japan issues a lot of distracting financial noise that involves evermore "creation" of their own "money," and the knock-on effects of that, but it's all just noise. Japan's only good choice is to go medieval, that is, to give up on the rather hopeless 150-year-long project of being an industrial-technocratic modern super-state, and go back to being an island of a beautiful artistic hand-made culture. I call that "going medieval," though you could quibble as to whether that's the best word for it, since I'm not talking about cathedrals or crusades.
One of Japan's other choices is to "go mad-dog," something they actually tried back in the mid-20th century. It didn't work out too well then. The Japanese leadership is making noises about "re-arming," and a nice state of conflict is already simmering between them and their age old rivals-victims next door in China, a country that has lately enjoyed the upper hand in the industrial-techno racket (though it will be faced with the same choices as Japan not too many years hence). Do the Japanese start another world war on their side of the planet? Let's hope not. Let's hope they lay down their robotics and their nuclear reactors gently and go back to making netsuke. Just give it up and do things differently -- after all, that's what all the human beings on the planet have to do now.
For what it's worth, Japan's stock market has tanked a hearty 14 percent in the past five days, if that means anything, and I'm not sure it does considering the aforesaid "noise," but there you have it. Our own stock markets are mercifully closed this holiday, having given American worriers an extra day of anxious reflection on the state of things out there. My own opinion is that we're all going medieval sooner rather than later and the big remaining question is how much of a mess we'll make on the journey to it.
Also, personally, I don't like these manufactured holidays when the landscape is cluttered with morons enjoying motorsports. I'll be working today, and grateful when it blows over.
Saturday, May 25, 2013
Monday, May 20, 2013
Kunstler: The New Abnormal
Go to the original link to see accompanying images.
By James Howard Kunstler
on May 20, 2013 10:03 AM
The collective state of mind in the USA these days may be even more peculiar than what went on in Germany in the early 1930s, when the Nazis were freely elected to lead the country and reconstructed the battered national psyche into a superman cult that soon beat a path to mass death and ruin. America has its own way of going crazy. We don't goose-step to tragedy; we coalesce into an insane clown posse and stumble into it by pratfall -- juggaloes dancing backwards off the cliff edge.
We've been softened up and made extra-stupid on a 60-year-long diet of TV and kreme-filled donuts. Instead of a "master race," our political fantasies revolve around a master wish - to get something for nothing. Want to feel good about yourself? Smoke some crank. Want to become economically secure? Buy a Powerball ticket or drive to the local casino. Want political esteem? Plug a flag pin into your lapel. Want status? Borrow free money from the Federal Reserve at zero interest and arbitrage it into massive earnings for your primary dealer bank. All these behaviors are the consequence of a culture that elevated advertising to such a high social good, it ended up drowning in its own manufactured bullshit.
A subset of our master wish has been on vivid display in recent months, namely the idea that God has blessed the USA with a limitless supply of new oil that will allow us to keep driving to WalMart forever. This propaganda from an oil industry desperate for capital investment has been swallowed whole by people in authority who ought to know better, just as that same class of people in Germany of 1934 should have known better about what they were bargaining for in economic well-being with the Nazi agenda. In our case, the propaganda drumbeat is being led by formerly respectable news organizations. The New York Times, National Public Radio, Bloomberg News, Forbes, and The Atlantic Magazine [Note: The Atlantic has changed over the years from a literary to a general magazine focused on "Big Ideas"==P.Z.] are media giants that have lately spread the "good news" that America will soon be 1) "energy independent," 2) the world's leading oil exporter (greater than Saudi Arabia is now!), and the "go-to nation" for cheap manufacturing.
All of these claims are false, by the way. The American way-of-life was designed to run on $20-a-barrel oil, not $90-a-barrel oil, and "new technology" has not changed that. The unfortunate and, to some extent, mendacious memes about the wonders of "new technology" have only snookered the public into a false sense of security about a future that will disappoint them badly and probably provoke an extreme political reaction as the reality of our predicament sweeps through daily life.
Most of the current "endless oil" fantasy revolves around shale oil. Just to get a visual idea of what this amounts to, consider this map. It depicts the two major shale oil production regions of the USA: the Bakken in North Dakota and the Eagle Ford "play" in Texas. Bakken production is confined almost entirely to four counties in North Dakota (Williams, Mountrail, McKenzie, Dunn). The Eagle Ford region touches perhaps ten Texas counties. Now, realize that the oil fields all over the rest of the USA (including Alaska) are in decline. Here's where the "bonanza" of new oil all comes from:
The oil coming out of these places is high cost and low flow-rate oil. This is exactly the opposite of what US oil production used to be (low cost and high flow-rate) when we were busy building all the freeways, strip malls, housing subdivisions, suburban office parks and all of the other stranded assets that now make up the infrastructure of daily life in this country. Those were the days when you could pound a single pipe vertically 1000 feet down (not much deeper than many home water wells) into the temperate wheatfields of Oklahoma (drive to work in shirtsleeve weather!) and after that modest investment in drilling you could kick back and depend on a great flow rate (5,000 barrels-a-day, not unusual) of sweet light petroleum for years.
Horizontal drilling (often more than 10,000 feet down + many "laterals" an additional 10,000 feet horizontally) and then fracturing "tight" rock for shale oil is not only a way larger capital expense (lots of steel!) but the flow rates per well (82 barrels-a-day average) are laughable compared to the halcyon days of conventional oil -- little better than "stripper" wells. Consider also that shale oil well flow-rates decline greater than 60 percent in the first year (rapidly thereafter, too) and you can see easily that there will be no "kicking back" to run the pump-jacks like cash registers, as in the old days. In fact, the rapid depletion only prompts more frantic drilling and re-drilling to keep the production at its current rate - the "Red Queen Syndrome" ("I'm running as fast as I can to stay where I am"), which means fantastic capital expenditure to keep drilling and fracking more wells (even more steel!). Consider also, that the small "sweet spots" in the shale oil regions were the ones drilled first (in earnest after 2003), for the simple reason that they were the most promising. This was the "low hanging fruit" -- easy to pick. Outside these sweet spots the oil may be too meager or difficult or costly to bother drilling for.
This is a picture of a boomlet that may run a few more years -- if the banking system doesn't implode and the massive stream of capital doesn't quit flowing to the shale counties. The excitement will all be over before 2020, but I suspect that troubles in finance and banking will put the schnitz on the shale gas mania long before that date. What will happen when the American public discovers that they were lied to about yet another important matter? The discovery will coincide with very severe changes in daily life that won't be avoidable. Everyone will be affected. Many will be impoverished and suffer real hardship. That's when the public goes apeshit and starts tearing down the house.
Apart from the issue of sheer economic suffering and all the damage that will ensue, consider that it will be generations before anyone believes the "authorities" again -- though, like the oil age itself, the era of giant national media will probably prove to be a one-shot deal, too. Future generations -- if they are lucky -- may read the news on one-page circulating broadsides, printed laboriously in hand-set type by letterpress. Or maybe they'll be reduced to just parsing out rumors.
By James Howard Kunstler
on May 20, 2013 10:03 AM
The collective state of mind in the USA these days may be even more peculiar than what went on in Germany in the early 1930s, when the Nazis were freely elected to lead the country and reconstructed the battered national psyche into a superman cult that soon beat a path to mass death and ruin. America has its own way of going crazy. We don't goose-step to tragedy; we coalesce into an insane clown posse and stumble into it by pratfall -- juggaloes dancing backwards off the cliff edge.
We've been softened up and made extra-stupid on a 60-year-long diet of TV and kreme-filled donuts. Instead of a "master race," our political fantasies revolve around a master wish - to get something for nothing. Want to feel good about yourself? Smoke some crank. Want to become economically secure? Buy a Powerball ticket or drive to the local casino. Want political esteem? Plug a flag pin into your lapel. Want status? Borrow free money from the Federal Reserve at zero interest and arbitrage it into massive earnings for your primary dealer bank. All these behaviors are the consequence of a culture that elevated advertising to such a high social good, it ended up drowning in its own manufactured bullshit.
A subset of our master wish has been on vivid display in recent months, namely the idea that God has blessed the USA with a limitless supply of new oil that will allow us to keep driving to WalMart forever. This propaganda from an oil industry desperate for capital investment has been swallowed whole by people in authority who ought to know better, just as that same class of people in Germany of 1934 should have known better about what they were bargaining for in economic well-being with the Nazi agenda. In our case, the propaganda drumbeat is being led by formerly respectable news organizations. The New York Times, National Public Radio, Bloomberg News, Forbes, and The Atlantic Magazine [Note: The Atlantic has changed over the years from a literary to a general magazine focused on "Big Ideas"==P.Z.] are media giants that have lately spread the "good news" that America will soon be 1) "energy independent," 2) the world's leading oil exporter (greater than Saudi Arabia is now!), and the "go-to nation" for cheap manufacturing.
All of these claims are false, by the way. The American way-of-life was designed to run on $20-a-barrel oil, not $90-a-barrel oil, and "new technology" has not changed that. The unfortunate and, to some extent, mendacious memes about the wonders of "new technology" have only snookered the public into a false sense of security about a future that will disappoint them badly and probably provoke an extreme political reaction as the reality of our predicament sweeps through daily life.
Most of the current "endless oil" fantasy revolves around shale oil. Just to get a visual idea of what this amounts to, consider this map. It depicts the two major shale oil production regions of the USA: the Bakken in North Dakota and the Eagle Ford "play" in Texas. Bakken production is confined almost entirely to four counties in North Dakota (Williams, Mountrail, McKenzie, Dunn). The Eagle Ford region touches perhaps ten Texas counties. Now, realize that the oil fields all over the rest of the USA (including Alaska) are in decline. Here's where the "bonanza" of new oil all comes from:
The oil coming out of these places is high cost and low flow-rate oil. This is exactly the opposite of what US oil production used to be (low cost and high flow-rate) when we were busy building all the freeways, strip malls, housing subdivisions, suburban office parks and all of the other stranded assets that now make up the infrastructure of daily life in this country. Those were the days when you could pound a single pipe vertically 1000 feet down (not much deeper than many home water wells) into the temperate wheatfields of Oklahoma (drive to work in shirtsleeve weather!) and after that modest investment in drilling you could kick back and depend on a great flow rate (5,000 barrels-a-day, not unusual) of sweet light petroleum for years.
Horizontal drilling (often more than 10,000 feet down + many "laterals" an additional 10,000 feet horizontally) and then fracturing "tight" rock for shale oil is not only a way larger capital expense (lots of steel!) but the flow rates per well (82 barrels-a-day average) are laughable compared to the halcyon days of conventional oil -- little better than "stripper" wells. Consider also that shale oil well flow-rates decline greater than 60 percent in the first year (rapidly thereafter, too) and you can see easily that there will be no "kicking back" to run the pump-jacks like cash registers, as in the old days. In fact, the rapid depletion only prompts more frantic drilling and re-drilling to keep the production at its current rate - the "Red Queen Syndrome" ("I'm running as fast as I can to stay where I am"), which means fantastic capital expenditure to keep drilling and fracking more wells (even more steel!). Consider also, that the small "sweet spots" in the shale oil regions were the ones drilled first (in earnest after 2003), for the simple reason that they were the most promising. This was the "low hanging fruit" -- easy to pick. Outside these sweet spots the oil may be too meager or difficult or costly to bother drilling for.
This is a picture of a boomlet that may run a few more years -- if the banking system doesn't implode and the massive stream of capital doesn't quit flowing to the shale counties. The excitement will all be over before 2020, but I suspect that troubles in finance and banking will put the schnitz on the shale gas mania long before that date. What will happen when the American public discovers that they were lied to about yet another important matter? The discovery will coincide with very severe changes in daily life that won't be avoidable. Everyone will be affected. Many will be impoverished and suffer real hardship. That's when the public goes apeshit and starts tearing down the house.
Apart from the issue of sheer economic suffering and all the damage that will ensue, consider that it will be generations before anyone believes the "authorities" again -- though, like the oil age itself, the era of giant national media will probably prove to be a one-shot deal, too. Future generations -- if they are lucky -- may read the news on one-page circulating broadsides, printed laboriously in hand-set type by letterpress. Or maybe they'll be reduced to just parsing out rumors.
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
The Great Ghastly
I'm dreading the Baz/Leo version of The Great Gatsby tonight since it seems that every generation gets The Great Gatsby movie it deserves...
— Bret Easton Ellis (@BretEastonEllis) May 14, 2013
Baz Lurhmann's awful "The Great Gatsby" seems like some kind of ghastly Illuminati prank with Leo fighting against it and losing, decimated.
— Bret Easton Ellis (@BretEastonEllis) May 15, 2013
==
20 May update: According to BoxOfficeMojo.com, The Great Gatsby has a budget of $105 million, and has earned a little over $90 million domestically. What is the point of all this?
Thursday, May 09, 2013
American #Morans: Chants of "USA! USA! USA!" erupt outside courtroom after conviction of Jodi Arias nydailynews.com/news/crime/jod…
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) May 8, 2013
I wouldn't call them "morons" (correct spelling) for chanting "USA", although I'd exclaim something like "Hallelujah!" or "Praise God!"
Wednesday, May 08, 2013
A Worthy Mini-Screed
A recent comment at NancyNall.com by coozledad, typical of his blitzkrieg prose. On the "neofeudalism" he says the Republicans want, it will/might happen (and not by design) in the Long Emergency that Kunstler has described in his book of the same name, and
detailed in his subsequent World Made by Hand fiction series. But at the same time, much wealth (which exists only on paper and in computers) will vanish. Think of the Great Depression. (Some say it'll just change hands). In other words, a lot of rich people, especially those with most of their money in stocks and other investments, will become poor.
===
38.coozledad said on May 8, 2013 at 12:05 pm
You have to remember the Republicans are essentially frustrated dynasts, and Bill Clinton, while politically indistinguishable from the Republicans, shit all over their plans when he defeated Bush the elder at the polls.
They want a sort of Christo-monarchy so they can mop up the last bits of natural resources and finish centralizing wealth in a neofeudal gambit. They’ve got plenty of willing little monkeys with that fundie mindset, and the ones that aren’t quite that stupid get snookered by the pseudohistories of Niall Ferguson and Jonah Goldberg.
Another distinguishing feature of the authoritarian mind is that reliance on hero figures that most modern cultures seek to discourage through higher education. The weepfest among American rightists(and virtually no one else) over the long overdue death of Margaret Thatcher gives some insight into their reflexive death occultism, and the eternal defensive crouch of the information deficient.
===
detailed in his subsequent World Made by Hand fiction series. But at the same time, much wealth (which exists only on paper and in computers) will vanish. Think of the Great Depression. (Some say it'll just change hands). In other words, a lot of rich people, especially those with most of their money in stocks and other investments, will become poor.
===
38.coozledad said on May 8, 2013 at 12:05 pm
You have to remember the Republicans are essentially frustrated dynasts, and Bill Clinton, while politically indistinguishable from the Republicans, shit all over their plans when he defeated Bush the elder at the polls.
They want a sort of Christo-monarchy so they can mop up the last bits of natural resources and finish centralizing wealth in a neofeudal gambit. They’ve got plenty of willing little monkeys with that fundie mindset, and the ones that aren’t quite that stupid get snookered by the pseudohistories of Niall Ferguson and Jonah Goldberg.
Another distinguishing feature of the authoritarian mind is that reliance on hero figures that most modern cultures seek to discourage through higher education. The weepfest among American rightists(and virtually no one else) over the long overdue death of Margaret Thatcher gives some insight into their reflexive death occultism, and the eternal defensive crouch of the information deficient.
===
Monday, May 06, 2013
The Associates: "13 Feelings"
I found this while browsing on Armond White's Twitter. It's the first time I've heard or heard of The Associates.
Saturday, May 04, 2013
A Belated Acknowledgment of May Day (a.k.a Lei Day)
May Day is observed the world over in various ways. In Hawaii it's known as Lei Day and was celebrated with pageants. I don't know if schools observe it the same way they did when I went to school, but it was a huge deal, particularly in elementary school (e.g., Keaukaha in the early-to-mid-1980s).
Here's an article on a Lei Day pageant held in Hilo a few years ago.
General busyness and an illness in the family have precluded me from actually observing May Day this year (no lei, no wearing an aloha shirt), but I must acknowledge it, and sometime I plan to look for photos of old May Days, and share them.
Here's an article on a Lei Day pageant held in Hilo a few years ago.
General busyness and an illness in the family have precluded me from actually observing May Day this year (no lei, no wearing an aloha shirt), but I must acknowledge it, and sometime I plan to look for photos of old May Days, and share them.
Friday, May 03, 2013
Monday, April 29, 2013
@the_real_fly I think Collins wants a parade now.Who The F**k cares! #nohomo
— Akolea (@akolea) April 29, 2013
Sunday, April 28, 2013
"Day by Day"
A version of this song was featured on tonight's Simpsons ("Pulpit Friction" [24: 18, 28 April 2013]).
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Eat More Kale vs. Chick-fil-A
I just saw this article on the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ruling in favor of Chick-fil-A vs. a Vermont entrepreneur who sells merchandise with the slogan "Eat More Kale." (Chick-fil-A's slogan is "Eat mor chik'n.")
I'll have more later. Until then, see my 29 July post, visit EatMoreKale.com, and don't forget to eat more kale!
I'll have more later. Until then, see my 29 July post, visit EatMoreKale.com, and don't forget to eat more kale!
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Georgie Fame: "The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde"
I've never heard of either the singer or the song until today.
Monday, April 22, 2013
More on Ebert
http://www.gocomics.com/tedrall/2013/04/10
Update: Do I agree that Ebert liked only middle-of-the-road stuff? Not necessarily. Did Ebert always like Spielberg's movies? And if he did, why couldn't he and Armond White, who were mutually antagonistic, have that in common?
Movie critics don't have the role, so to speak, in the larger culture that they once did. Ebert is the last great mainstream movie critic (at least for now). I liked him, but for sheer erudition and prose style, John Simon is unparalleled. Not that I always agreed with his reviews.
1 May update: Nancy Nall has always loved him.
@wideasleepnima @mlake9 As I told @antloewenstein, release hasn't been officially announced, but I will do that soon. Thx for supporting!
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) April 22, 2013
Sunday, April 21, 2013
Richard Heinberg on Twitter
Here is the Twitter of peak oil writer Richard Heinberg.
A recent tweet of his:
nice article from Chris Nelder on why peak oil is still relevant. ow.ly/k2BN7
— Richard Heinberg (@richardheinberg) April 14, 2013
This is the Indiegogo page for his upcoming book Snake Oil: How Big Energy's Misleading Promise of Plenty Imperils Our Future.
Saturday, April 20, 2013
Boratland
What's Chechnya? To most Americans, it's all Boratland.
See this map, for example.
20 April evening update: Bill Maher argues with professor Brian Levin about Islam.
The Chechens are an ancient and distinct people.
See this map, for example.
20 April evening update: Bill Maher argues with professor Brian Levin about Islam.
The Chechens are an ancient and distinct people.
Friday, April 19, 2013
Skee-Lo
@skeelo_musik Congrats on the "I Wish" track on the Toyota Rav4 "Wish Granted" Commercial!!!
— MUSTAFA M SHABAZZ (@SUCKERFREERADIO) April 15, 2013
@robertecrump @mlake9 every frat douche i went to college with wore a white hat like that.
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) April 18, 2013
I found this through Max Blumenthal's Twitter.
One thing for sure. Muslims can't seem to live in peace with anyone. Even each other. FACT.
— Chuck Woolery (@chuckwoolery) April 19, 2013
Thursday, April 18, 2013
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
NYRB Founding Editor Robert Silvers
An interview with Robert Silvers, the founding editor of The New York Review of Books, which has just had its fiftieth anniversary.
The New Leader was around for eight decades, approaching nine, if one counts its online version.
Monday, April 15, 2013
Boston Marathon Explosion
News broke on TV about 9:15 a.m. Hawaii time. There's already a Wikipedia article on the Boston Marathon explosion and Max Blumenthal, listening to a scanner, has been tweeting updates.
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Louis Proyect's Latest
Two recent posts by Louis Proyect reaffirm why I regularly visit his blog. The first, "The Koch Brothers Hedge Their Bets," takes on fracking and more. And the second is a review of the documentaries American Meat and The Revolutionary.
Thursday, April 11, 2013
The return of Mad Men is nigh! For lovers of great TV, tonight is a high holiday because Mad Men is the best show on TV right now.
— Touré (@Toure) April 8, 2013
I've never watched it. But The Carrie Diaries is the most wonderful show of 2013.
A List of British Movies Yet Unreleased on Region 2 DVD
A list from IMDb.com of British movies and TV shows made in 1977 yet to be released on region 2 DVD.
One can get a sense of the time just before Margaret Thatcher became prime minister.
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Monday, April 08, 2013
Sunday, April 07, 2013
All In With Chris Hayes: Should It be Moved to Another Timeslot?
This article details the ratings trouble All In and a new CNN show have encountered. All In is opposite ratings juggernaut The O'Reilly Factor. *Should it be moved to another timeslot? Or should it be left where it is and emphasize its difference from the Factor, the way The Rachel Maddow Show, opposite Hannity, differentiates itself from that show? (see below)
It's good to know they're giving All In a chance, the way networks used to give a chance to shows that weren't initially ratings blockbusters.
===
*I found out that Who's the Boss? first aired on 20 September 1984, the same day The Cosby Show premiered. For its first month, Who's the Boss? was broadcast on Thursdays opposite Family Ties (which immediately followed Cosby), and suffered in the ratings. The next month, it was moved to Tuesdays, where it stayed for several years, and the show became one of the top-rated sitcoms of the late `80s.
It's good to know they're giving All In a chance, the way networks used to give a chance to shows that weren't initially ratings blockbusters.
===
*I found out that Who's the Boss? first aired on 20 September 1984, the same day The Cosby Show premiered. For its first month, Who's the Boss? was broadcast on Thursdays opposite Family Ties (which immediately followed Cosby), and suffered in the ratings. The next month, it was moved to Tuesdays, where it stayed for several years, and the show became one of the top-rated sitcoms of the late `80s.
Wednesday, April 03, 2013
Have any great journalists come out of a journalism program? Or great writers from an MFA program?
— Mark Ames (@MarkAmesExiled) April 1, 2013
Max Blumenthal's New Book Goliath Release Date Pushed Back to June
Searching online for reviews of Max Blumenthal's new book Goliath, I found none. The book's Amazon page might explain why. The release date is now 11 June, for whatever reason.
Louis Proyect: "Thoughts on Harper's Magazine and Intellectual Property"
In which he finds Harper's not as relevant as it used to be. He recommends subscribing to n+1 instead.
Proyect mentions, but doesn't include a link to, this interview with former Harper's editor Roger Hodge, in which Hodge points out problems that potentially spell the end of the magazine.
4 April update: I posted a comment to Proyect's blog. I subscribe to Harper's and Bookforum. Will Harper's go defunct before my sub runs out in Nov. 2015? If I didn't subscribe to either magazine, and browsed them at the newsstand, which one would I be more likely to buy? At this point I'd say Bookforum ($4.95), with its many, many book reviews and edgy writing. Harper's ($6.95) is more of a mixed bag. Its "Easy Chair" and "Anti-Economist" columns are a play for the Washington relevance The Atlantic enjoys, and its choice of Readings is more predictable than what I remember from the `90s, when I first began subscribing. Yet the March issue has a lengthy report on the cost of North Dakota's fracking boom, a review of a biography on P.G. Wodehouse and a feature on adult animation coming of age with the fX show Archer. It's this variety of writing, and a certain remove from the buzz-chasing world of opinion magazines, that are among Harper's strengths.
No one magazine can do it all. What Harper's lacks, an n+1 might have. But n+1 lacks what Harper's has. So I read the (relatively) edgy and stodgy together.
Proyect mentions, but doesn't include a link to, this interview with former Harper's editor Roger Hodge, in which Hodge points out problems that potentially spell the end of the magazine.
4 April update: I posted a comment to Proyect's blog. I subscribe to Harper's and Bookforum. Will Harper's go defunct before my sub runs out in Nov. 2015? If I didn't subscribe to either magazine, and browsed them at the newsstand, which one would I be more likely to buy? At this point I'd say Bookforum ($4.95), with its many, many book reviews and edgy writing. Harper's ($6.95) is more of a mixed bag. Its "Easy Chair" and "Anti-Economist" columns are a play for the Washington relevance The Atlantic enjoys, and its choice of Readings is more predictable than what I remember from the `90s, when I first began subscribing. Yet the March issue has a lengthy report on the cost of North Dakota's fracking boom, a review of a biography on P.G. Wodehouse and a feature on adult animation coming of age with the fX show Archer. It's this variety of writing, and a certain remove from the buzz-chasing world of opinion magazines, that are among Harper's strengths.
No one magazine can do it all. What Harper's lacks, an n+1 might have. But n+1 lacks what Harper's has. So I read the (relatively) edgy and stodgy together.
Monday, April 01, 2013
Kunstler: "Are You Going to Entropy Faire?"
Here.
An excerpt:
Meanwhile, at the fifth annual BRICS* summit, held in Durban, representatives from the five member nations began negotiations to establish a bank to counter the influence of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
According to the MarketWatch article linked to above:
"Collectively, the five BRICS nations account for 42% of world population, 20% of output, and nearly all of current growth in the global economy."
(*BRICS: Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. Formerly known as BRIC until South Africa joined the bloc in 2010.)
An excerpt:
While The New York Times focuses on the momentous issue of real estate sales in the Hamptons, Russia and China will build gold-backed currencies aimed at monopolizing the trade in mineral and energy resources, leaving America and much of Europe to freeze in the dark and sit on gasoline lines at the empty filling stations. For a while that will work to the East's advantage - until it becomes clear that the entropic contraction of industrial economies is for everyone as we veer into a literal world made by hand. That's right, sooner or later Russia and China will get theirs, too. But in the meantime they have the ability to make the story a lot more interesting.
There's plenty of suspense this Easter weekend as observers nervously await the breaking action, to find out how much the oft-cited fear of confiscation has penetrated the regional money centers around Europe. Slovenia, a fairy-tale republic somewhere between Austria and the Duchy of Grand Fenwick, has been nominated by observers as the place most likely to be whacked by EU treasure confiscators. It owes about 10 billion Euros to the EU entropy cloud, with exactly zero chances of meeting its obligations.
Meanwhile, at the fifth annual BRICS* summit, held in Durban, representatives from the five member nations began negotiations to establish a bank to counter the influence of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
According to the MarketWatch article linked to above:
"Collectively, the five BRICS nations account for 42% of world population, 20% of output, and nearly all of current growth in the global economy."
(*BRICS: Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. Formerly known as BRIC until South Africa joined the bloc in 2010.)
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